
Idea from obvy: try tying into infobot (purl) to identify IRC moods: 
@moods = qw(indifferent flame_mode pissed inebriated happy sad)

Links from Na'im Tyson:
www.ruf.rice.edu/~barlow/corpus.html (corp. lx.)
ciir.cs.umass.edu (info. ret)
www.georgetown.edu/wilson/IR/IR.html (class in IR @ Georgetown University)
www.research.att.com/~lewis (professional homepage
  of David Lews, one of the leaders in document
  categorization.  you may want to visit his site
  sooner than the others since he has left AT&T research.)

